Review: Atlas of Australian Resources, Second Series. Population Distribution and Growth

Summary

Norma McArthur reviews Population Distribution and Growth, a map-sheet with 18 pages of accompanying text issued in 1964 by the Department of National Development as part of the Atlas of Australian Resources, Second Series. She praises the ingenuity of mapping population growth and spatial distribution together, but finds the diagrammatic scheme complex and recommends starting with the commentary. L. L. Robson’s commentary chiefly examines changes in population distribution across the states between 1954 and 1961. Its historical introduction emphasizes the early concentration of population in urban areas, and it cautions that urban expansion absorbs formerly rural areas, complicating comparisons of urban and rural growth rates. F. Lancaster Jones’s supplementary note compares Radcliffe-Brown’s estimates for 1788 with recorded or estimated state populations in 1961, described as the first reasonably complete count of the Aboriginal population. Jones warns that this population could double within 26 years and urges attention to the social implications.